


MerMay

by RocRolWriter



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Deceit has his canon name, mer!Deceit, mer!logan, mer!patton, mer!remus, mer!roman, mer!virgil - Freeform, mermay2018-2019 while I wait for the 2020 list
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-20
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:14:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 10,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23955934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RocRolWriter/pseuds/RocRolWriter
Summary: Objective: to write 1,000 words a day all month using the MerMay prompt list.  The Sides are merfolk, etc., chapters are named for the prompts I use (note: at the time that I started this, the prompt list for MerMay 2020 hadn't been released yet; so what I'm doing right now is looking at the lists for the past two years and writing chapters based on where those two lists overlap - and hopefully the 2020 list will be released before I run out of pairs).
Comments: 15
Kudos: 52





	1. Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: 05/07/2018 and 05/22/2019

In the deep waters of a gentle sea lies the wreckage of the Enchantress, a ship potentially lost during a freak storm hundreds of years ago. She's in excellent shape, except for the large crack in her starboard hull. The cold waters help preserve what remains of her, but a few large, aquatic creatures see her as their new home. They're a calm bunch in the safety of her waters, and they all seem content enough to share this abandoned vessel as a group like a family of sorts. 

Thomas paddled downwards, Joan and Talyn right behind him. Following half-remembered directions and the few obvious landmarks, he approached Patton’s home—and the whole way he hoped that the friendly merman was telling the truth when he said that Thomas would be welcomed, and that he could bring friends. Just because Patton was this friendly, didn’t mean the rest of his family would be; and these merfolk weren’t _just_ a blend of human and fish, there was some crab in there. Those claws could… 

Thomas shivered, and not just from the water. 

Talyn tapped his ankle. “Hey, you alright?” zir voice echoed over their communicators. 

Thomas looked back. “Yeah, just…second-guessing whether or not this is a good idea.” 

“It’ll be fine,” Joan piped up. “You don’t actually think Patton is such a bubblehead that he’d set up a disaster with us and his bros, do you?” 

Well…when you put it like _that…_ “Not to that degree, no.” 

“Ooh, is that it?” Talyn pointed past Thomas. 

Thomas looked ahead again. The Enchantress makes for an impressive sight, like a show of defiance against the chaotic nature of life. She still stands upright for the most part and her remaining sails swing in the gentle currents. Crates, chests, and barrels are scattered across the floor and half buried under sand. A few have been cracked open and nothing remains inside. 

There's no sight of any human remains either, hopefully because they made it out safe and sound at the time of whatever caused the ship to sink. 

“What, no coral?” Thomas mused. 

Joan looked up at the surface—which was a long way off, as they were in the midwaters. “It’s pretty dark for coral; _and_ cold.” 

“Patton?” Thomas called. “Are you home?” 

Glistening eyes peeked through a window, but their owner didn’t come out or make a sound. 

“Thomas!” From above the deck came hurtling a blur of soft grey and sky-blue, slamming into Thomas for an enthusiastic tackle-hug. “I knew you would come to visit! Oh, and you brought friends!” He beamed brightly around at Joan and Talyn before calling back to the ship, “Guys, Thomas and his friends are here!” 

“Well, some friends…” Thomas managed as other merfolk slipped out of the ship. One was a vivid white and red like a fancy koi, with fins that swept around him like banners; another was nearly solid blue, with far more practical and less dramatic fins. A third merman, black and green with banner fins, tried to make the same kind of entrance that Patton had only to be hauled back into the ship by someone who chose to not come out himself (eliciting loud protests from the green one). Finally, a purple and black figure slid out along the sand, seeming almost to hide under his fins. All were eyeing Thomas and friends with varying degrees of curiosity and suspicion. 

Thomas took a deep breath, hearing it echo in his breathing mask. Before he could make any kind of introduction however, Joan chose to introduce zirself. 

“Take a look at my crab claw,” ze quoted, holding zir hands up and moving zir fingers in an imitation of crab claws. Zir own mask hid zir smirk, but you could see it in zir eyes if you got close enough to look through zir goggles and you could _definitely_ hear it in his voice in spite of the slight electronic distortion. 

Thomas and Patton both cracked up, and even Talyn snorted with laughter. 

“Like _why?!_ ” Thomas managed to get out. 

The next few minutes turned into a “look at my crab claw” contest between Joan, Talyn, Patton, and the red and white merman (the mermen were clearly winning, according to Regal Red, since their hands were almost crab claws in the first place) while Thomas laughed, Deep Blue looked on in confusion and Shy Violet smirked and shook his head at all their antics. 

Eventually they all calmed down; Thomas introduced Joan and Talyn, and Patton introduced Roman, Logan, and Virgil. 

“Who was the green guy?” Thomas asked, waving at the ship. 

Roman sighed. Loudly. “That was Remus; not sure you really want to meet him, he’s rather…disturbing and dramatic and…” 

“And he’s your brother, Princey,” Virgil spoke up. 

“That’s hardly my fault!” 

“Wow, but, you let him live here even though he’s ‘disturbing’?” Thomas asked, “That’s some brotherly love right there.” 

Roman sighed again, somehow more resigned than exasperated. “I’m just glad to have some help keeping track of him, honestly; it was a nightmare when it was just the two of us and I had to drag him out of…ugh, _everything_.” 

“I thought I saw someone else there,” Talyn piped up. 

Joan nodded. “Yeah…yellow and black eel-kinda guy?” 

Thomas stared at Joan. “How’d you catch that?” 

Joan shrugged. “I wasn’t the one getting attacked with affection; probably helped.” 

“That eel fellow has been living in the bowels of this mighty vessel far longer than the rest of us have,” Roman proclaimed. “He graciously permits us to share…” 

“This vessel is far too large for a single merman to inhabit alone,” Logan added, “he had no logical reason to turn us away.” 

“But he rarely socializes, and he won’t tell us his name or why he was here all alone,” Patton continued sadly. 

“I would have expected that he’d have told _you_ his name, Dark and Stormy,” Roman added to Virgil, “You were here next-longest, weren’t you?” 

“Yeah, no, we didn’t socialize at all with each other,” Virgil replied with a shrug. “Patton was the one who brought ‘family nights’ to the Enchantress as a concept.” 

“And we’re all one big happy family now!” Patton added firmly. 

It sure seemed that way to Thomas.


	2. Whale

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: 05/10/2018 and 05/29/2019

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't understand how spoiler tags work, especially when everybody on Tumblr (and probably ever other media platform) is talking about exactly that spoiler. Still, I'm going to put "spoilers" and "Deceit" in the same sentence and figure you've been sufficiently warned.

The humpbacks had returned. 

It wasn’t that the waters above the Enchantress were particularly rich in whale food, to anyone’s knowledge; they just passed through on their migrations. Used to be they _just_ passed through, not slowing or even talking to each other particularly. Lately, they had taken to pausing in their migration to circle above the Enchantress and sing of the oceans where they had been. 

It wasn’t hard to find the reason for the change. The merboys of the bright water liked to sing at the whales—Roman and Patton made music and entertained the pups, while Logan had figured out how to converse intelligently with the adults (as far as the darker mer were concerned). Lately, even Virgil had joined in the songs—and keeping Remus inside while all this excitement was going on was nearly impossible with only one person guarding the door. 

Only Deceit remained aloof. 

It wasn’t that he disliked the humpbacks; they were intelligent, and large enough to cast shadows and further darken the midwaters where the Enchantress laid. And it was entertaining to watch the pups play. It was just… 

Deceit studied his reflection in an old mirror. It was tarnished and cracked, distorting the image—but even a perfect mirror wouldn’t make his face look normal. 

From a distance, or if one saw his fishtail first, he _did_ look normal; a mottled black-and-gold eel. Up close, once your gaze passed his crab legs and started travelling up the more humanoid parts of his body, the distinction between his left and right sides became more marked. The yellow on his left side broke down to disgusting shades of green and orange, like dying kelp, while staying yellow on his right. His fins were all black, but on his left they curved into their points while on his right they splintered like a freshly-broken shell. His claw-hands didn’t quite match either—the left was like a sickle while the right was like a shovel. His left eye was gold and slit-pupiled; his right eye was brown and round-pupiled. Not even his teeth were immune to the strange imbalance. 

There were many theories about why he looked the way he did—he’d heard them all speculating through the walls. Logan’s theories (“hypotheses, I have no facts to support them”) ranged from a simple mutation to a severe accident, while Roman and Remus kept trying to top each other with more and more outrageous tales involving curses. His former people claimed he was to be emissary for the ice-drake of the deep. 

_Deceit_ neither knew nor cared what the truth was; only that it had been the bane of his life growing up. His mother protected him from the wrath of the others until she died in an accident, and then they chased him out. Nobody could look at his horrible face—this face that was two faces at once—and trust or accept him. 

He actually _had_ gone swimming with whales before; only with pods that had no pups, and always taking special care to stay on one side or another of the entire pod so that they would only see one part of him at a time. It was nice, to feel like a part of a family. 

This pod had pups though; excited to play with the finny creatures that were so much smaller than their parents. Not to mention the “finny creatures” themselves would be there. 

He could hear them singing. 

He wanted to join them. 

He was afraid. 

Patton had pressured Deceit to join “family night” and he had, for some peace; he stayed under his fins as much as possible (just because they already knew he was a freak didn’t mean he was interested in them staring at him), and Patton let him get away with that because at least he was out of the ship’s hold and participating. That would not be possible up there at the top of the midwaters. They and the whales would see. 

How could they accept him? 

A loud and dramatic voice echoed through the hold. “Ho, my eel bro?” 

Deceit grimaced. “Remus,” he bit out. He and Roman sounded similar, but Roman wouldn’t abandon an audience just to talk to a merman he didn’t even like. 

“You gonna join the party? We’re all having a grand old time up here playing with the babies!” 

“We have discussed this.” 

“Have we?” 

Deceit turned to look full-on at Remus. “You know why I’m not going out there.” 

“Sure; you’re scared.” 

“What? No!” 

“Hey, I’m not judging; even those babies are huge, and the parents?” Remus clicked appreciation. “One good smack and you’re in pieces. But these humpies know us and they’re not gonna go mental.” 

“I’m not scared of the whales!” Oh, that was a lie. He was scared that _they_ would be scared of _him_ and smack him away from the pups. Not to mention… 

“Roman’s already told them about you anyway.” 

“I—what?” 

Remus nodded. “That’s why I’m here; they want to meet you.” 

“Why did he…why do they…” Deceit trembled. “…What did he tell them?” 

“That he’s worried about you. So scared of being hurt again that you hide away from anything that _might_ hurt you.” Remus looked at him knowingly. “Believe it or not, my bro has the same problem; his hidey-hole is just a lot less literal.” 

This was rapidly turning into too many revelations at once. “I thought he didn’t like me. Didn’t trust me.” 

“He considers himself my keeper, and he asked you to help.” Remus shrugged. “We don’t always like each other, I’ll admit to that, but he would never sic me with someone he didn’t trust.” 

Huh. 

Remus’s ears twitched. “You hear that? The humpies _want_ to meet you.” 

Deceit's mismatched ears lifted. Now that he was _listening,_ he could make out the entreaties. Singing what they knew of him, coaxing him out so they could learn more. 

He took a deep breath. “I…suppose…” Then he was being dragged by Remus out of the safe dark confines of the ship and into the open waters. 

To be greeted by smiles. 

Shyly, he smiled back. Then he took a deep breath and began to sing. 

**“My name is Janus.”**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to the famILY, Janus.


	3. Beached

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: 05/11/2018 and 05/14/2019

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Curious about how Thomas met Patton? This is how. Just because they can move about on land doesn't mean it's impossible to get stranded on the shore, or that it's not dangerous for them to be stranded.

Patton stirred, roused by the light filtering through the water. It was much brighter than normal; it took him a while to remember that he’d gotten turned around in the dark while exploring last night and had taken shelter to wait for daylight.

At least he’d been able to call Logan with his enchanted conch to reassure the family that he was all right. Virgil might still worry, but at least he wouldn’t have a panic attack from a lack of word.

Patton uncurled from the rock he’d wrapped himself around and stretched to his full length, his fins breaking the surface as he flexed the kinks out of his body—

 _The surface?_ It hadn’t been close enough the night before to breach with a careless stretch!

Startled, Patton curled up again and looked around. The shallow stone well he’d sheltered in the night before was a tidepool, just large enough and deep enough for him to lie down in. Now he couldn’t even see over the wall because there was only enough water to fill the pool, with none to spare.

“I _thought_ this place smelled strange,” Patton mused. Rocks and sand smelled different when they alternated between wet and dry.

Well, if this was a tidepool then the ocean couldn’t be too far away, right?

Patton eyed the surface warily. The only way to know was to stick his head up and look, but if a land creature was up there…

Whatever, he’d deal. He had to look.

Patton sat up and stuck his head out of the water. For a moment he kept his eyes clenched shut, waiting for…he didn’t know. Something to hit him, possibly. Then he squinted around through the waterless light at the shore.

No one was nearby. That was good.

And the ocean was—

_No way._

How did he get so far up on the shore? High tide must have been especially high last night—and now it was very low—and it was so far away and he _couldn’t breathe air_ and—

Patton ducked back below the surface and took several deep breaths. “Okay, calm down…calm down…” He pulled out the conch and tried to call Logan; its tone echoed in the tidepool but didn’t go any further. “Great, I need to be in the ocean itself for the shell to connect?” He couldn’t just sit here and wait for the tide to come back in; that would take hours, during which he’d be either bored out of his mind or discovered by a dangerous land creature.

Okay…no contact. It was up to him to get himself out of this mess. He sprawled on the floor of the tidepool and started going over his options.

Merfolk couldn’t breathe air, but they did have an ability that allowed them to bring water with them when for some reason they needed to leave the ocean for an extended period. Unfortunately it required starting with a lot of water, and if Patton tried it now he’d be leaving very little water for the poor creatures that couldn’t get out of the tidepool—or he could try to bring them _with_ him, which wouldn’t be easy on account of them swimming around and possibly crawling on him and trying to get out of the bubble.

Patton popped up and looked at the ocean again, trying to gauge just how far it was. _I_ think _I can hold my breath long enough to run down there. Maybe._ Briefly he envied the humans; they might only have two legs, but those legs were built for swift land movements. By comparison, his six legs were short, skinny, and slow. _I have to try._ Lowering back down, he opened his gills and started pumping water; in, in, until it felt like he had two pufferfish in his back. Then he clamped his gills shut, as tight as he could press their edges when they were so full, and hauled himself onto the beach.

* * *

Thomas’s first thought when he saw the giant blue and grey lobster-fish explode out of the tidepool was that he was hallucinating. His second thought, as he watched it charge down the beach, was that it was on a time limit.

His third thought was, _he’s not going to make it,_ just about the time it collapsed halfway between the tidepool and the waves. The third thought was what spurred him into action, running over the beach toward the strange creature that was still trying to drag itself into the sea.

It was a merman, slightly bigger than Thomas; and he was so focused on his goal that he didn’t notice Thomas until he was right there. He startled away, making a strange gasping noise and wildly swiping out with—holy shit, his hands looked like crab claws with more fingers!

“Whoa, whoa, hey—sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you…” Thomas trailed off, noting that the merman’s chest wasn’t moving even as the rest of him was struggling. “…Do you need water in order to breathe?”

The merman paused, brown algae-like hair dripping into wide dark eyes. Then he nodded.

“Would you like some help getting to the ocean?”

The merman let out a thin whine and nodded faster.

“Okay,” Thomas got down on his stomach next to the merman, “Can you get on without tearing me to shreds?” Bridal style and over-the-shoulder were both out of the question: the merman was too big for those. Piggyback was the only realistic option.

The merman gave his body a heave and sprawled on top of Thomas, knocking the air out of him for a minute—and making him question whether this was a good idea, because this guy was heavy!

Too late to back out now, though. Thomas pulled his limbs under him and, with a massive effort, he pushed to his hands and knees. Getting all the way up wasn’t going to happen, so he just started crawling toward the waves as fast as he could while the merman hung on tight.

Water started running down Thomas’s sides; did that mean the merman was starting to suffocate? He tried to crawl faster…where was the water—

A wave hit him in the face, startling him into falling over and dropping the merman into the shallows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There will be a sequel to this chapter; I don't know if it'll be the _next_ chapter, but I'm not going to just leave it here.


	4. Monster

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: 05/14/2018 and 05/23/2019

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Might as well admit I've fallen slightly behind, but the week has been a bit busy; I'll catch up again later in the month.

The twins’ former kingdom considered Remus a monster; his ideas of entertainment had always been gruesome, and he didn’t always care about consent when he was in the mood to play. _Roman_ didn’t even like Remus’s pastimes (he’d been the victim of some of them).

Still, when the time had come to banish Remus because they were so repulsed by him…all Roman could think was of the two of them together as children, building castles out of seashells and pebbles. Of how, when he _was_ an unwilling participant in one of Remus’s games, how his brother would always provide gentle aftercare _and_ would play Roman’s way for at least a week before going back to his naughtier habits.

They didn’t always like each other, but they would always love each other. And when push finally came to shove, Roman turned his back on an entire kingdom rather than let his brother swim off alone.

And then, when they found a place that they could call home, what was the first thing Remus did? He found himself some kind of tentacle monster in the nearby canyon and took it back to the ship as a pet.

_I love you bro; but for the life of me I don’t understand you._

More amazing was that the other two residents were fine with the tentacle monster being given a room in their ship—as long as Remus kept it contained, which fortunately wasn’t impossible: it might be boneless, but there was still a limit to how small a space it could squeeze through.

It was feeding time for the thing now. Roman listened at the door, ready to rush in the minute it sounded like things were getting out of hand.

“Here you go, Fluffy; a dozen clams just for you.” There was a scraping sound as Remus pushed his basket across the floor. “Oh, come on now, you know how to open that…yes, that’s it, such a smart squishyfish!”

Remus didn’t know what the blasted thing was either; just that it had tentacles. Logan had an open-ended invitation to come and examine Fluffy, see if he could identify it—but he’d readily admitted that he wasn’t familiar with the creatures of the depths, and wouldn’t be able to narrow their choices down by much. So far, he hadn’t taken them up on their invitation.

What probably didn’t help was that neither brother could give Logan a 100% guarantee that he’d be able to leave the room again unharmed: Remus couldn’t actually control Fluffy. Hence why Roman was listening at the door—and had taken it upon himself to listen at the door every feeding time.

“Mm-mmm, are they good? Good clams? Look at you chowing down, such a good boy!”

Remus was an enthusiastic pet owner, Roman could give him that.

“Roman?” It was Patton. “Is everything all right?”

“At the moment; Remus is feeding Fluffy.”

Patton’s face did something complicated. He had mixed feelings regarding Fluffy. “It only takes one slip-up…”

“I know. That’s why I’m here.” 

* * *

Remus wasn’t a total idiot; he knew that one slip-up with Fluffy would result in becoming dinner himself. So, although he loved Fluffy’s hugs, he always waited until after mealtimes—and being sure Fluffy was full—before allowing the physical affection to begin.

Fluffy knew this too. From one monster to another, they had a mutual understanding.

Pretty soon the basket was empty, and Fluffy was reaching for Remus with _all_ his arms. Remus, grinning, swam right into them.

It didn’t take long before he was squirming, relishing in the almost ticklish sensations as Fluffy explored his body by feel. Every session resulted in some new discovery about one or the other of them; Remus was pretty sure these hugs would climax (heh) in them actually fucking one day, and although he wasn’t fully committed to that endgame, he’d be lying if he claimed to not be intrigued. It was already fun when…

“Ah, ah, gently there!” Remus’s gill covers closed, briefly trapping the tentacles that had started to poke inside. It wasn’t precisely that he minded Fluffy examining his gills, but he did need them to breathe and their covers were rock-hard because they were _delicate_ inside.

Fluffy paused in his ministrations. Then when Remus relaxed again…well, he went right back to what he was doing, but slower and with even more care as he brushed at the fragile tissues.

People thought Remus had no self-control; if he actually cared enough about their opinions, he’d point out that it took shiploads of self-control to _not_ instantly thrash away from something getting stuck up his gills—and that thrashing, especially when the something was quick enough to already get in deep, was a good way to damage the gills.

And oh, mighty currents, Fluffy was in deep. It was getting a little hard to breathe, just from having the tentacles stuffed in there; like, Remus was starting to get more concerned about getting “choked” than about having his gills ripped up. He let Fluffy play a bit longer, until his brain started to buzz from the lack of oxygen, and then squeezed the tentacles again with his gill covers. “Okay, out.”

Even now, Fluffy was gentle: he took care not to damage anything on the way out.

Then just as Remus started to relax, one of the tentacles paused and prodded…something…in his left gill. Something that Remus couldn’t quite feel—which, in the middle of super tender and delicate flesh, probably meant that it wasn’t his.

“What is that,” then Remus cut off with a hiss as Fluffy pulled on it.

More tentacles swarmed the spot, working at whatever-it-was with their tips to remove it.

Finally, with a little stab of pain that had Remus whimpering, the tentacles were gone—and one lifted in front of his face to show the tiny squirming thing wound up in its tip.

Well, Remus didn’t recognize it. But since there wasn’t a good reason for any creature to _live_ in someone else’s gills, it was probably a parasite. “Oh, thanks. I guess I’m due to visit a cleaning station, huh?”

Monsters looked out for each other.

Just like brothers did, Remus thought fondly as Roman knocked. How lucky he was to have both.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I saw a different fanfiction where a tentacle monster was nicknamed Fluffy and the idea was too funny to pass up. I don't remember which fanfiction that was or I'd credit it.


	5. Hidden

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompts: 05/18/2018 and 05/15/2019

The waters and seafloor immediately around the Enchantress couldn't provide her inhabitants with _everything_ they needed; when they required something they couldn't just find, they had to venture out to one of the three merfolk cities within a twenty-minute current ride. Remus couldn’t be trusted on a solo shopping mission, Virgil hated crowds in general, and Janus couldn’t show his face in public without causing a panic; the three of them stayed at the Enchantress whenever shopping needed to be done. 

_Probably why Virgil and Janus were so willing to let the rest of us stay,_ Logan thought sardonically. _With us here, they can stay hidden in their comfort zones._

Currently Logan was swimming to Port Suncroft, to purchase a list of essentials too complicated to dictate. It was almost a slum compared to Pristine Barrier where he used to live, or the twins’ former kingdom of Arrecife Majestuoso; being right under the docks of a very busy seaside town meant there was a lot of trash falling in, and a risk of getting hit by boats coming and going. However, there were merfolk there who did business with humans and as a result they had supplies that couldn’t be found anywhere else in the ocean…including one of Logan’s own guilty pleasures. 

Arrecife Majestuoso was a little farther out from the Enchantress; usually only Patton went shopping there, as it was far too fancy for Logan’s taste and, although _Roman_ had not technically been banished, he’d still chosen to boycott the reef kingdom that had cast his brother out. Pristine Barrier was even farther afield, and only Roman could go shopping there because neither Patton nor Logan could ever go back. 

They hadn’t been banished though. They’d escaped, just ahead of Pristine Barrier Security. 

Logan sighed. Dwelling on that time was pointless; they were here now, living in a wrecked galleon, which itself was several miles deeper than Pristine Barrier as well as far away. It was just so frustrating, all the more so because he still didn’t know _what he’d learned_ that suddenly turned him into “Public Enemy Number One,” as Virgil described it when he’d first heard the story. Things didn’t stay hidden from Logan for very long; mysteries and secrets were too tempting for him to not try and unravel. Has a creature set up a home nearby? He _must_ determine its species and habits, and whether it will cause them harm if left alone. Has a plague struck? He’s excited to find the cause, symptoms, and treatments. It was one of the things that made him such a valuable commodity in Pristine Barrier. Until it made him a liability. 

The trouble was that he had just come up from one of his researching frenzies when Security turned up, and he’d learned a lot of things; he had no idea which of those things was something the ruling council didn’t want anyone to know. 

Patton always said they didn’t really value _him,_ just the things he learned and the work he did. Logan didn’t object to that necessarily—he needed far less emotional validation than Patton, Roman or Remus, even Virgil. Knowing how things worked was important, and that was that. Still, the truth of Patton’s words was proven when they revealed their intent to arrest him, despite all he had done for Pristine Barrier. Disposable. 

_I’ll fight you._

Logan smiled softly at the memory of Patton’s threats, voiced _every_ time _anyone_ started bad-talking themselves, as he glided into Port Suncroft. 

Then he took in the atmosphere and his smile vanished. Something was wrong. There were people about, true, but there was tension in their bodies as they swam. Logan was bad with emotions, but he could usually recognize them for what they were. Irritation. Fear. It probably wasn’t the humans—what they did up there _could_ cause these emotions down here, but given how deep the mer city was to avoid the boats it generally had to be _extremely_ severe before it caused this level of reaction…at which point Logan would be able to perceive the cause of the trouble. No, this was happening on a more personal level. 

“Well, if it isn’t my best customer!” 

Logan turned to the shop owner. “Hello, Marion.” 

Her smile was too tight, her claws digging into the wood of the doorframe. “I have some new flavors for you; would you like to come in and try them?” 

An alarm seemed to go off in his head. “I have some other things I need to buy first,” he said slowly, trying to understand what he was perceiving. 

“Who says no to free samples? Come in, _please!_ ” she beckoned with a graceful wave. 

Marion never handed out “free samples” of the product she obtained from humans…and that “please” sounded like a cry for help. Still he hesitated, shooting looks around. 

“Your friends are handling your other errands anyway, aren’t they?” 

That made Logan swim closer, eyes narrowed. “What friends? I came alone today.” In fact, he usually came alone. 

Marion grabbed him and dragged him inside. “They showed up yesterday and started hassling people—asking for you by description,” she hissed. “And I don’t really think they’re your friends, unless you make a habit of befriending people more uptight than you, but they look enough like you that I think they’re native to the same area you were.” 

Logan froze. “White armor?” 

Marion’s gills flared in a merfolk snort. “Yeah, that didn’t last more than the afternoon in these waters. You know them?” 

“Not personally, but I do know their kind. Is there a place I can access the surface from here?” 

Marion started dragging him again, way to the back of her shop, and pushed him into a closet—no, it was more like a dumbwaiter. “That leads to the surface; it’s how I get my supplies. Take care.” Marion closed the door. 

Logan took several deep breaths and started climbing. He’d long ago figured out how to breathe air: the trick was keeping the gills wet. He’d mastered it in the name of scientific research, now he would use it for survival. Hopefully, the humans at the top of this shaft were friendly and would help him stay hydrated until it was safe to return.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise, every time I write a chapter with a cliffhanger-esque ending there will be a later chapter somewhere to tie it back up.


	6. Shark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompts: 05/21/2018 and 05/10/2019

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: mention of blood and semi-graphic description of injury

_Blood. Screaming._

_Black scales and scraps of pink fins floated loose as the shark tore into Zia, its teeth leaving deep gashes in her flesh._

_Roman slashed at the mighty beast in desperation, and after a minute Remus joins him. Eventually they succeed, but not before the shark rips off one of Zia’s gill covers._

_As they dragged her unconscious body back to Arrecife Majestuoso, Roman glared at Remus._

_“What? She wouldn’t stop harassing you, so I did something about it.” Remus shrugged. “What’d you think was going to happen when you left me unsupervised?”_

_“I_ thought _you’d cut her hair off, or something equally embarrassing but not harmful! I_ didn’t _think you’d go tickle a shark—this is way over the line!” Roman struggled to calm down. “If she dies, we’re done. This…I can’t handle this.”_

* * *

Roman woke up gasping for breath as the memory of the _other_ reason he’d left with Remus flooded his mind.

He hadn’t been banished along with Remus, but he _should_ have been because the incident had been his fault. Zia had been hassling him more than usual, nagging him about actually working towards his dreams (when he _was_ working, just not as fast as she thought he should, and it wasn’t even her job to make him work!) and trying to guilt-trip him, and he’d had enough; normally he kept a close watch on Remus to keep his crazy tendencies concealed, but that time he’d deliberately been careless. Remus knew how overbearing Zia was; it was a safe bet that he would turn his nasty humor on her.

And he did, just, he went way too far.

Zia _did_ recover; the gill cover didn’t grow back though, meaning she needed a prosthetic cover to protect her gill. She couldn’t talk for nearly as long because it was hard to breathe with a damaged gill, and she couldn’t leave the water at all because her prosthetic couldn’t close up tightly enough for her to hold her breath on that side.

Remus didn’t seem to care much. After learning that she’d be fine and that Roman wasn’t abandoning him, he didn’t care at all.

There was a banging on the wall. “Rooomaaaan, I’m _booorrrred!_ ”

Janus poked his head around the corner. “Oh, don’t trouble yourself, it’s not like he’s driving me crazy or anything.”

Roman sighed. Janus always had trouble coming out and saying what he meant: he ranged from obfuscation to outright lies. In this case, Roman was pretty sure Janus was being driven crazy by Remus and was begging for a break—proven by his look of relief when Roman replied, “No, I can take him for a swim. Go have a nap or something.”

Remus tackled Roman as Janus discreetly slipped away. “Where are we going? To the mudhole? The slimy caves? Can we go shark-hunting?”

Roman shuddered. “ _Not_ shark-hunting—at least not today. I literally just woke up from a nightmare…”

“It’s not even night!”

“…About the last time you went shark-hunting in Arrecife Majestuoso waters.”

Remus went quiet. “Okay.” Then he grinned again. “But, if we do happen to find a shark while we’re out swimming, can we fight it?”

“Sure.” It was too much work to get Remus to _not_ fight something that he thought would make a good fight, and besides, Roman did like shark leather. 

* * *

They wound up visiting Thomas and his friends on a small dock. Rather than risk straining their gills, the merfolk stayed in the water and periodically bobbed down to submerge their spiracles for a breath. where Remus excitedly regaled them with his many shark tales. (Heh, Patton would like that one.)

“Hey, I was wondering,” Joan spoke up, “Are there any shark-mermaids out there?”

Roman shrugged. “Not that I know of.”

Remus scoffed. “If they exist, they can’t use their gills in a fight; sharks don’t have chompy covers.”

“What?” Thomas asked, looking surprised.

What, had he not noticed Patton’s? Well, but Patton didn’t like hurting people, so perhaps it made sense; his favorite move was giving people hugs that lasted for as long as he could get away with.

Remus climbed out of the water, sprawling on the dock between Thomas and Joan (and practically at the feet of another human, who Thomas had introduced as Terrence) and snapped his gill covers open and closed a few times. “See, look, chompy gills!”

Roman sighed heavily and grabbed Remus’s tail—he couldn’t pull his twin back into the water, but he could keep him from doing anything stupid up there. “Yes, our gill covers can double as weapons; it’s risky to use them that way, so we mostly save it for when we’re _sure_ we’re faster than our enemy and can strike-and-close before they can retaliate.”

Joan fingered the serrated edges of Remus’s gill covers curiously. “Huh.”

“Also when we can hit first then we can hit even harder with it,” Remus added ghoulishly.

Roman pulled on Remus’s tail. “Alright, back in the water.”

Remus pouted, but shuffled backward off the deck.

“How does that work though?” Thomas mumbled.

Remus gave Roman a look that was a strange combination of excited and pleading.

Roman scrubbed his face with an aggravated noise. “ _Stay here,_ and don’t wreck anything; I’ll get you something you won’t have to hold back on.” He ducked underwater and swam off.

Fortunately it didn’t take long to find a large piece of driftwood; not the most ideal target dummy, but it did mean Remus would have to work harder to break it, so he’d appreciate that.

As he returned, he was relieved to see that nothing had been damaged in his absence; Remus seemed to be disturbing Thomas with his stories though, so it was time for a distraction.

“Think fast!” he shouted, using his tail to throw the driftwood.

Remus dove under for a breath—then came back up spinning, gills wide open and water spraying out in a violent exhale. His right gill tore a chunk out of the driftwood, and the water slowed its momentum, before the driftwood knocked him back into the shallows.

“Was that really necessary to…” Thomas began.

Remus came back up grinning. “Did you see that?!”

“…Never mind,” Thomas laughed as he nodded acknowledgement.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let that be a lesson: push Roman too hard, and you'll have to deal with Remus.


	7. Gold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompts: 05/22/2018 and 05/06/2019

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Basically three vignettes of the boys shopping; I don't know if all of these are happening at the same time, or if they're more spread out - I'll figure that out later, when I turn these MerMay prompts into an organized story with a beginning, middle, and end.

Logan shuffled out of the dumbwaiter, taking careful breaths and tasting the air. The humidity right now was…moderate; he was in no danger of his gills instantly drying. And it smelled like paradise in here, crushed fruits of all kinds wrapped around his senses threatening to smother him.

_My God, she buys her jam straight from the source?_

“Can I help you?”

Logan startled and looked around. A human in an apron was standing in the doorway of a supply closet, staring at him in surprise.

“Ah…” he didn’t dare say he came up here to avoid soldiers: they would think he was a criminal and throw him back. “…Yes, I came to purchase some jam; due to the shopkeeper below primarily building her stock from flavors that will sell in significant quantities, it is often more difficult to find varieties that are best enjoyed in moderation.”

“It’s that water-magic nature of yours, isn’t it? It reacts to any innate magic in the berries. And you have negative reactions to the seeds, which is why you people have to be picky about which ones you buy that have seeds.”

Logan nodded. “I would have said selective, but that is an accurate description.”

The human suddenly chuckled. “You like Crofter’s?”

Logan realized there was a rumble of pleasure coming from his throat—not quite a purr, but similar. The smell was getting to him. “Very much, yes.”

“You do business with gold?”

“Often.” The shopkeeper below preferred being paid in gold, perhaps because her supplier asked for gold.

“Come on, the shop is this way.”

The employee let him into the front, and he looked at the wares. Jars lined every shelf, brilliant colors showing through their glass; their labels were pristine, revealing some flavors he knew and many he didn’t. His claws itched to fill his bags with jars. _I am going to spend all of my gold here, aren’t I?_

* * *

It was hard to stay on task; Arrecife Majestuoso had so many beautiful shops with so many colorful things in them! But the pets needed food, and Patton was the only pet owner who could supply it, so he needed to spend gold on them first.

“Let’s see, pudding for Mr. Glow-Worm, clams for Fluffy, and blackpins for…Virgil’s…little friend.” Patton could never retain the name of that creepy crawly death dealer. Still, as long as it stayed fed it would stay in Virgil’s room and not stalk the rest of the Enchantress; he wasn’t interested in facing that thing’s wrath, so into the basket went its food.

When he finally left the pet shop, he wasn’t swimming: he was walking, carrying the filled food basket on his back like a crab with an anemone friend (were those the things crabs carried on their backs to ward off predators? Patton couldn’t remember).

“Hello Patton!”

Patton turned carefully to look at a shop with mountains of toys in the window—and the shiny black mermaid with long brown hair and pink fins. “Hello Zia! How are the playmates?”

“They’re just fine. Made some new junk warriors.” Zia tended to be short-spoken, on account of her running out of breath so quickly.

Patton carefully set the basket down and swam over. “How about you? Are you doing okay?”

Zia hummed, turning her scarred side away self-consciously. “I…well…”

“C’mere,” Patton quickly gathered Zia in for a hug, patting her hair and carefully not touching the prosthetic. “It’ll be okay.”

They sat like that for a minute before Patton pulled back with a bright smile. “I found some new shinies! Wanna swap?” Unlike most shops, Zia was glad to accept junk rather than gold as payment; no doubt because she used that junk to make more treasures to sell.

They negotiated back and forth, and Patton finally returned to his loaded basket with a new plushie clutched in his arms—and smiling at the knowledge that besides the surface-made cup and cutlery he’d given her, he’d also snuck some gold into her tip jar. 

* * *

_From prince to delivery boy,_ Roman chuckled to himself as he swam the streets of Pristine Barrier. The living-coral buildings were far less elegant here than in his home kingdom, but they were certainly clean; really made him wonder if they encouraged cleaner-shrimp to live in the nooks and crannies.

It had been a few weeks since he was last here; he’d dropped off a shark skin that Remus had taken great delight in cleaning and preparing (Roman had _no_ clue how he didn’t shred the thing) so that it could be turned into leather. Now it was done—or it _should_ be done—and he had to collect it.

Realistically he was the only one who could get take skin to become leather; Logan would, but he’d said there was no tanner’s shop at Port Suncroft and he was reluctant to visit Arrecife Majestuoso any more frequently than he had to. As for Patton, the leathermaking process itself tended to upset him, so although he’d use leather once he had it, he didn’t want anything to do with the process.

Roman just wished there was another tanner’s shop in Pristine Barrier. The merman in charge of the one he’d found was extremely…holier-than-thou, gave Roman the third degree on the skin (the species of shark, how old it had been, etc.) and took great delight in lecturing him on which sharks were on the no-kill list and why before he would even take the skin and agree on an amount of gold Roman had to pay. He had no doubt that the man would have refused to take the skin if it had come from a threatened or endangered species of shark.

It was a leopard shark. Least Concern, according to the humans’ rankings at least.

Patton had warned him that most shopkeepers in Pristine Barrier were like that: just a little too eager to show off their knowledge. But it didn’t make dealing with them all that much easier.

At the shop, Roman quickly paid for his leather and left; he didn’t want another conversation with this guy.


	8. Plant

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: 05/25/2018 and 05/27/2019

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I guess this is part one of how Virgil ended up at the Enchantress. I'll no doubt use a later prompt to actually get him there.

Merfolk energy reacted badly to plant energy—it tended to soak up their spells, and if the plant could strike back (and some could) it seriously hurt. Merfolk only approached plants when they had to and tried to make their time near the plants as short as possible.

Which was why Virgil was now swimming through the kelp forest.

The thunderbeast currently destroying his village was just as susceptible to plant energy as a merman—if not a little more so. It wouldn’t follow him in here, certainly not _deep_ in here. If Virgil cut straight through the forest and out the other side, he would be safe.

Provided the forest itself didn’t eat him first. But hey, that was the risk he had to take.

Something moved in his peripheral.

Virgil didn’t think; he swam up and left, away from the movement—and unlike any other idiot trying to escape a potential threat in a hostile situation, he looked where he was _going_ instead of back towards the movement so he didn’t run into something else. When he slowed and glanced back, he saw a disgruntled-looking plant monster settling back down with an “I didn’t want to eat him anyway” attitude.

_Yeah, keep telling yourself that._

Fortunately, like, ninety percent of plant creatures were scavengers and/or opportunistic feeders rather than true hunters; they didn’t like going to the effort of finding mobile meals. So long as Virgil stayed attentive, saw them before they saw him, and kept his distance…he would be safe.

Safe being a relative term.

Virgil settled on a rock and checked his map. It didn’t have the whole kelp forest, he knew that, but he at least wanted to know when he’d left known territory.

And this rock was…

Right at the edge of “known territory.”

“Okay,” Virgil took a deep breath. Then another. “Okay.” He checked his bag again and made sure he still had hidescraps and inkpins. If he was going to avoid swimming in circles until a plant monster got off its butt and intercepted him, he was going to have to map as he went. Keep track of every fin flick, every turn, document precisely where he was at any given moment so he would know whether he had been somewhere before. And while he was at it, find a safe place to stop for the night when he could no longer see to map.

And hopefully sleep a little, though he really didn’t expect to get _much_ sleep among all these many plants.

“Here’s hoping this forest isn’t so big that I’ll be lost in here for weeks,” he muttered. 

* * *

It had been three days. His map of “known territory” had nearly doubled in size (he’d had to attach new pieces of hidescrap to the edges to make more room for the expansion), and he kept a tally on the back for every time it got too dark to navigate. And yes, he was mostly just dozing rather than getting true sleep. It turned out, many of the plant monsters were semi-nocturnal—they used photosynthesis during the day, only moving if something blocked their light and ignoring potential prey even when it was literally right in front of their faces, and then they would go into predatory mode by night. They still weren’t really hunters, so…small mercies.

It was a good thing he wasn’t a sound sleeper, because a couple of times he’d jarred awake to a shellcap or cactry shuffling up thinking he might be food. Neither liked the surface at night, so he just swam up to lose them. That worked on pomadrakes too—fortunately, because pomadrakes were harder to fight off.

There was a rustling in the kelp.

 _That’s…too big to be a plant monster._ Virgil turned to look.

And immediately started swimming the other direction as fast as he could. _Why is a Gigapin dragon in this forest?!_ They were too big for enclosed spaces!

The part of Virgil’s brain that wasn’t busy with the fight-or-flight response figured that this meant he was close to the border. At least, he hoped so because it was officially chasing him now and he needed a hiding place that wasn’t likely to kill him like these plants would.

He couldn’t literally swim at top speed for hours, but it felt like he had been by the time he shot out of the forest. And kept going in desperate hope of finding a hiding spot. He wanted a hole, narrow enough and deep enough that the dragon couldn’t follow him inside or reach him.

He didn’t find one before it got too dark to see.

Alternately he could keep swimming until it got too cold; most dragons hated cold more than they liked the water. And since night had fallen it would start to get cold, but would it cool off quickly enough?

Well, maybe the cold plus the starlight would do it: Gigapins were one of like two species of dragon that only hated the stars a little bit, but they did still hate the stars. And the air would be colder than the water.

Virgil swam up. His gills burned clear to his spiracles, his arms and tail screamed for mercy, but he kept fighting towards the surface.

He was going so fast that when he breached the surface, he shot twenty feet into the air—but not straight up. He went at an angle, determined to come down somewhere _other_ than in the same area as the dragon.

And smacked into a sea stack that he hadn’t been able to see in the dark.

 _Whatever._ He grappled for the stone with his claws and crawled rapidly around it, finally able to take a minute and breathe. Air wasn’t the easiest, but his gills were wet enough to handle it for a little while.

The dragon faceplanted into the stack with enough force that Virgil nearly fell off—and then, to his eternal relief, it gave up.

Probably. He’d stay up here, with _careful_ dips to keep his gills wet, until morning when he’d be able to see if the dragon was still there. It was a huge neon-purple dragon, shouldn’t be too hard to spot.

Then he’d go looking for a new home.


	9. Ghost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompts: 05/31/2018 and 05/02/2019

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Follow-up to chapter 3: Beached.

Thomas floundered back to the surface and looked around. The merman was nowhere to be seen; had he already returned to the deep? 

Suddenly the merman bounced back to the surface, spraying water everywhere. “Thanks for the ride! I’m Patton!” 

Thomas let out a startled laugh at the cheerful figure. “Hello Patton, I’m Thomas.” 

“Hello Thomas!” 

“What were you doing in the tidepool?” 

“I got there last night during high tide to take shelter.” 

“Ah…got stranded?” 

“Yeah, pretty much.” 

Thomas frowned. “Wait, shelter from what? There wasn’t a storm last night.” 

Patton eyed the water uneasily and paddled a little closer to Thomas, dropping his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Ghosts.” 

“Wh-ghosts? Of _what_?” 

“I’m not sure. Logan said…” 

“Logan?” 

“A guy I live with…he calculated that there are as many as thirty-four ‘species’ of ghost haunting the oceans, and almost all of them look like drowned surface creatures. The ones that I got away from looked like giant jellyfish merged with nightmares though.” Patton shuddered. 

Thomas puzzled that one out. “But wouldn’t they live in the depths, where it’s always dark?” 

“I don’t know ghosts. Virgil says…” 

“Another guy you live with?” 

“Yeah—he says that like half of those species of ghost can be found everywhere in the ocean, floor to surface, shallows to deeps; everywhere water magic exists, which is also a merman’s range so.” 

“How many guys do you live with, and how many of them like to scare you with ghost stories?” 

“Oh, there are six of us altogether—and only two of them ‘like to scare’ people with their ghost stories. Logan just shares facts…like how there are hypothetically ten ghosts that are shallows-only and they’re not scary at all.” 

Thomas grimaced and looked back at the shore. 

“Don’t worry,” Patton hastened to reassure Thomas, “There aren’t any ghosts here right now, they fade in daylight.” 

“I’m more concerned about joining them; it’s getting harder to stay afloat.” He was tired from carrying Patton down the beach, and they’d drifted a little way from shore while they were talking. 

Patton dove under the water. 

Thomas barely had a moment to wonder if he’d actually left this time when he felt fins brush his inner thighs, and suddenly he was sitting on Patton’s back. 

“You did give me a lift; tit for tat and all that,” Patton told him, winking cheekily over his shoulder. 

Giggling nervously, Thomas scrabbled over Patton’s back with his hands trying to find something safe to hold onto. The gray shoulder fins rustled in a way that looked inviting, so he grabbed on tightly. “Is um…is this okay?” 

“Of course—not _too_ tight, they are attached after all, but you can hang onto those.” 

Patton swam over to a low outcropping of rocks—and then held rock-steady so that Thomas could climb off. It wasn’t a smooth dismount: Thomas’s foot caught on something on Patton’s back, and he nearly fell on his face while the merman somersaulted in the water. 

“Are you okay?” was Patton’s first question when he came back up. 

Thomas sat up. “Yeah…” he studied his foot; there was an impressive bruise already starting to form on the top of his ankle. “What about you? What’d I kick?” 

“My operculum. Don’t worry, it didn’t really hurt, it just surprised me.” 

“Oh; okay.” Thomas frowned in thought. “Wait, your what now?” 

Patton rose out of the water to about waist-high and turned around, making a deliberate show of opening and closing his gills. 

“Oh, is that—like, a fancy name for your gills?” 

“Mm…” Patton sank back down and turned around to rest his chin on the rock. “It’s a fancy name for the gill _covers._ They’re mostly made of bone, they’re _supposed_ to be strong enough to take a hit; they’re protecting delicate equipment that happens to be vital, after all.” 

“Ah.” Thomas folded up and rested his chin on his knees. “Sorry.” 

“Hey, don’t worry about it.” Patton carefully ran the back of his claw over the bruise, like if he touched it gently enough it would go away. 

“So you’re…scared of ghosts?” 

“What?” Patton looked up. “Oh, no—I mean, not really…not like in a phobia kind of way. But pretty much all of them have this nasty trick where they can make you live your worst nightmare, and…if you’re lucky, you come out of it and the ghost is gone—if you’re _really_ lucky, you’re in the arms of a good friend. If you’re not lucky, you don’t come out of it at all because the ghost ate you.” 

Thomas stared. “Is that the voice of experience talking?” 

Patton laughed a little. “No, thank goodness; I don’t personally know anyone who has gone through that themselves, actually.” He thought that one over, frowning. “Though I’ve never been a hundred percent certain Virgil hasn’t lived through one of those, he’s jittery enough…” he mused. With a little shake he added, “But no, Logan’s a scholar and he’s read all the documented cases of ghost-attack survivors, trying to establish whether or not there’s a reliable way to beat the nightmare ability.” 

Thomas made an interested noise. “Any luck?” 

“Depends. Different ghosts need different techniques—at least for us merfolk. Maybe humans can use whatever trick they want on _all_ the ghosts.” Patton counted on his fingers. “It’s pretty simple, you’ve got fight, which is obvious; flight, which is obvious; and freeze, which is when you curl up and hide all your tender parts. Most of the time freezing is a little better than fighting.” Patton tapped his chin. “Which is good, because I don’t like fighting.” 

“But running was the smarter decision last night?” Thomas asked knowingly. 

“Yeah, there were too many to take hits from.” Patton looked at the sky. “I should get home now.” 

“Will I see you again?” The question fell unbidden from Thomas’s lips—but he liked Patton. 

Patton looked surprised. Then he smiled happily. “Sure, kiddo! It’s hard for me to be on land for too long, but…can you come tomorrow? I’ll bring you something so you can call me!” 

Thomas thought for a minute and smiled. “Yeah, I can come down tomorrow.” 

“Cool, see you then!” Patton waved brightly as he sank out of sight.


	10. Sea Slug

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompts: 05/23/18 and 05/09/19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This prompt was going to be chapter 8, but I had trouble finding the inspiration so it ended up getting skipped twice.

“Hey Thomas, come take a look at this.”

Attracted by Joan’s voice, Thomas came out on deck. “Sup?” Following zir gaze, Thomas saw that the surface of the water was covered in what initially appeared to be purple flowers with thin orange petals. “Wow—that’s pretty.”

Joan nodded in acknowledgement, a wry smirk twisting zir lips. “Pretty colorful…pretty painful. Those are sea slugs—a species called the Spanish Shawl. The bright colors warn predators that they don’t taste very good, and they sting.”

Thomas eyed the creatures more dubiously. Now that he had a better idea what he was looking at, he could make out that the purple was the slug’s body and the orange bits were…tentacles? “Are they actually a danger to us?”

“They get their stinging properties from the sea anemones they eat, which are _mostly_ harmless to humans—but there are a few nasty ones. Since we don’t know what these guys have been eating, it’s generally safer to avoid them.” Joan suddenly leaned forward and peered into the shallow water. “Did your mer-friends tell you how they handle sea-creature stings?”

Thomas blinked. “No. Why?”

Joan pointed. “Look _past_ the slugs.”

Thomas looked. There was a shadow in the water, twisted among the rocks and lying very still. As he watched it moved a hand up to brush at the sea slugs very slowly.

“He knows what he’s doing?” Thomas squinted. “I think that’s Virgil.”

“What’s he doing there?”

Thomas snorted. “What are _we_ doing here?”

Joan held up zir camera. “Pictures of the wildlife.”

“He might just be experiencing nature too.”

“That’s fair.” Joan thought for a moment. “I guess of the guys we met in that ship, Virgil is not the guy I’d expect to hang out with stinging creatures. Roman might.”

“ _Roman_ might actually get stung,” Thomas laughed briefly. Then he turned thoughtful. “I haven’t really spoken to Virgil much; he hides more than the others.”

“You want to talk to him now?” Joan looked back and forth between Thomas and the slug-filled water. “I don’t recommend sticking your hand in there.”

“No, I have something else in mind.” Thomas pulled out the whistle that Patton had given him, extended its handle, and dipped the end in the water. With a careful flick of his fingers he circled the whistle beneath the surface, making water flow through its holes. Thomas knew neither he nor Joan would hear the sound it made, since sound didn’t jump mediums very well, but when Patton gave it to him the first time he’d ducked underwater to play with it and it made a pretty chord.

Below them Virgil’s head jerked up and he stared as though he could see them through the water distortion.

Well, maybe he could; who was Thomas to say when he’d barely known about the existence of merfolk for a little more than a month? There was so much he still didn’t know about these people of the sea.

He waved, on the off chance that Virgil _could_ see him. 

* * *

Virgil had known there was a boat with people in it, of course; you couldn’t take a seacraft, even one so small and riding so high on the water, into a cove this small and think to be unnoticed by an attentive merman. But he’d been willing to completely ignore them until one of the humans stuck a mer-crafted seawhistle in the water and spun a few notes.

If he’d known about Patton’s plan to gift a seawhistle to a human before the oh-so-optimistic merman had done it, he’d have spoken against “putting our tools in their hands” simply for all the things that could go wrong; fortunately for his sanity, Thomas appeared friendly enough and his own heightened anxiety meant he was unlikely to just lose the thing (but not impossible). This whistle looked and sounded like the one Patton had given Thomas, meaning it was either Thomas up there or someone had taken the whistle and was pretending to be Thomas. It _looked_ like Thomas…but Virgil wasn’t familiar enough with the range of human appearances to know how “common” his appearance was. It could be anybody up there.

 _To surface or to stay below…_ Virgil ran a claw through the sea slugs’ cerata, thinking. Did he sufficiently trust that it was Thomas up there—and that the human with him was one of his friends?

After about a minute of nothing happening, the human with the whistle set his hand on the water. Just…on the water, barely breaking the surface…and then he just stayed there. In easy reach (if Virgil was inclined to move) of getting grabbed and dragged down for a face full of stinging by sea slugs.

Virgil blepped.

It smelled like Thomas.

 _Well._ Unwinding from the rocks, he slowly lifted up and allowed his fins to breach the surface. Then his head—at first just half of it, putting his eyes above the water so he could stare questioningly at the hand, then the rest so he could look properly at the humans.

“Hey Virgil,” the other human said—that voice sounded like Joan’s. Sort of (Virgil had very little practice matching sounds in water to sounds in air).

“Sup,” Virgil answered shortly. Then, “What are you guys doing here?”

Joan waved a black box with a round shiny spot. “It’s called a nature shoot; we’re out here taking pictures and we’ll make a compilation of them later.”

“Why?”

“Why not?”

Thomas snickered slightly at his friend’s non-answer. Regaining his composure, he asked, “What are _you_ doing here, Virgil?”

Virgil rapped his claws on the side of the boat. “Mmm…” he sighed. “Some days I wake up feeling like a sea slug…so I go find some and commune with them. It helps me feel better about myself because sea slugs are actually pretty fascinating.”

Thomas nodded. “Oh, I know, right? Are you immune to their stings?”

“Nope, I have to be careful. Probably wouldn’t kill me, definitely _would_ hurt.”

They talked for a bit longer about inconsequential things; when the conversation finally died and Virgil left, he felt even better.

It was…nice…that a couple of humans cared.


End file.
